Growing on the mountains, Arnica may be said to possess a native affinity to the effects of
falls. As its German name, Fallkraut, attests, its value as a vulnerary has been known from
remote times. It may be said to be the traumatic par excellence.
Trauma in all its varieties and effects, recent and remote, is met by Arnica as by no other single drug, and the provings bring out the
appropriateness of the remedy in the symptoms it causes. Tumours in many parts, following
injury, have been cured by Arnica, including scirrhous
tumours of the breast. Nervous affections as chorea after falls. It is suited to plethoric
red-faced persons; "Arnica is particularly adapted
to sanguine, plethoric persons, with lively complexions and disposed to cerebral congestion.
It acts but feebly on persons who are positively debilitated, with impoverished blood and
soft flesh. This may be the reason why it is eaten with impunity by herbivorous animals as
Linneus remarks" (Teste). It is suited to persons who are extremely sensitive to
mechanical injuries, and who feel the effects of them long after; persons easily made
train-sick or sea-sick. Patients complain that the bed is hard no matter how soft it may be.
Arn. corresponds to the effects of violent cough or
sneezing; the child cries before cough comes on (or with the cough) in whooping-cough.
Chronic bronchitis when patients have bruised, weak aching in the chest, or great
sensitiveness of the chest on exertion, or walking. Allied to wounds are hæmorrhages, and Arnica causes and cures hæmorrhages of many kinds: dilatation
and rupture of small blood-vessels. Vomiting, coughing, purging, accompanied by streaks of
blood in ejecta; extravasation of blood into the conjunctiva as in whooping-cough.
Hæmorrhages into the tissues of internal organs or the skin. An odd symptom of Arnica is "coldness of the nose." A case of facial
(left) neuralgia, face swollen, dark red, very painful to touch, was cured with Arnica (radix), the guiding
symptom being "cold nose." Patient had bitter taste; was very excitable, and < at night. Ussher notes that the local use of Arnica produced an extraordinary growth of hair on a limb. This
suggested the use of an oil mixed with Arn. 1x in a case
of baldness, which was followed with marked success. Arn.
affects the left upper extremity and the right chest. There is a putridity in connection
with Arnica excretions, as with Baptis.,
which it resembles in typhoid conditions: putrid breath; fetid sweat. With Arnica there is apt to be incessant passing of stool and urine in
these states. Nash gives the following as "leaders": "Stupor, with
involuntary discharge of fæces and urine." "Fears being touched or struck by
those coming near him." Putrid smell from mouth." "Bruised, sore feeling in
uterine region; cannot walk erect." "While answering falls into a deep stupor
before finishing." "Head alone, or face alone, hot; rest of body cool."
"Many small boils, painful, one after another, extremely sore."
"Suddenness" is a feature of Arn. pains and action. P. P. Wells relates a cure of
double pleuro-pneumonia in a child with sudden stabbing pains on both sides of the chest
almost preventing breathing. Arnicainstantly caused a violent aggravation, the next instant relief
was perfect, and the child fell asleep breathing naturally. I once ran a piece of wire into
the tip of one of my fingers, causing paralysing pain. I applied Arn.
1x at once, and the pain was better instantly─seeming to be wiped out
from the point of injury up the arm. There is < in
damp, cold weather with Arnica, which is included by
Grauvogl among the remedies suited to the hydrogenoid constitution (comp. Baryt. c.). Motion and exertion <.
(Bruised, aching sensation in chest on walking.) >
Lying down, and lying with head low; but < lying on
left side.

Arnica

should not be used externally where there is broken
skin. For torn and lacerated wounds Calendula must be
used locally.

Mechanical injuries. Fright or anger.
Excessive venery (vaginitis in the female, impotence in the male).

SYMPTOMS.

1. Mind.─

Hypochondriacal anxiety with fear of
dying and disagreeable temper.─Declines to answer any questions.─Great
agitation and anguish, with groans.─Unfitness for exertion, and
indifference to business.─Apprehension and despair.─Over-excitement
and excessive moral sensibility.─Great sensitiveness of the mind with
anxiety and restlessness.─Tendency to be frightened.─Quarrelsome.─Combative,
quarrelsome humour.─Tears.─Shedding of tears and
exclamations of rage.─Opinionated.─Foolish gaiety,
levity, and mischievousness.─Absence of ideas.─Depression
of spirits and absence of mind.─Says there is nothing the matter with
him (in typhoid fever, &c.).─Abstraction and musing.─Unconsciousness
(like fainting after mechanical injuries).─Delirium.

2. Head.─

Whirling giddiness with obscuration of
the eyes, chiefly on getting up after sleeping, on moving the head, or in walking.─Giddiness,
with nausea; when moving and rising; better when lying.─Vertigo when
shutting eyes.─Pressive pains in the head, principally in the forehead.─Cramp-like
compression in the forehead as if the brain were contracted into a hard mass, chiefly when
near the fire.─Pain, as if a nail were driven into the brain.─Dartings,
pullings, and shootings in the head, principally in the temples.─Incisive
pain across the head.─Cutting through the head, as with a knife,
followed by a sensation of coldness.─Stitches in the head, esp. in the
temples and forehead.─Effects from concussion on the brain.─Pain
in the head over one eye, with greenish vomiting (after a strain of the back).─Heat
and burning in the head, with absence of heat from the body.─Burning and
heat in the head, the rest of the body is cool (night and morning, <
from motion, > when at rest).─Heaviness
and weakness of the head.─Pains in the head, brought on, or aggravated
by walking, ascending, meditating, and reading, as well as after a meal.─Tingling
at the top of the head.─Immobility of the scalp.

3. Eyes.─

Pain, like excoriation, in the eyes and
in the eyelids, with difficulty in moving them.─Red, inflamed eyes.─Inflammation
of the eyes with suggillation after mechanical injuries.─Burning in the
eyes, and flowing of burning tears.─Eyelids swollen, and with
ecchymosis.─Pupils contracted.─Eyes dull, cloudy,
and downcast.─Eyes prominent, or half open.─Fixed,
anxious look.─Obscuration of vision.

4. Ears.─

Pain, as of contusion in the ears. Acute
pulling in the ears.─Shootings in and behind the ears.─Hardness
of hearing, and buzzing before the ears; from blows.─Blood from ears.

5. Nose.─

Pain, as of contusion in the nose.─Tingling,
in the nose.─Nose swollen, with ecchymosis.─Nasal
hæmorrhage.─Ulcerated nostrils.─Coryza, with
burning in the nose.─Cold nose (A. radix).

6. Face.─

Face pale and hollow, or yellow and
bloated.─Heat in the face without heat in the body.─Hard
swelling, shining redness and heat in one cheek, with throbbing pain.─Puffing
of cheeks on breathing.─Tingling round the eyes, in the cheeks, and in
the lips.─Pustulous eruption on the face, chiefly round the eyes.─Dryness,
burning heat, swelling, and fissures in the lips.─Ulceration of the
corners of the mouth.─Paralysis of the lower jaw.─Painful
swelling of the submaxillary glands, and of those of the neck.─Trismus,
with the mouth closed.

7. Teeth.─

Pain in the teeth, with swelling of the
cheeks and tingling in the gums.─Sensation of pulling in the teeth while
eating.─Loosening and elongation of the teeth.─Toothache
after operation.

8. Mouth.─

Dryness of the mouth, with thirst.─Saliva
mixed with blood.─Sensation of excoriation and itching on the tongue.─Tongue
dry, or with a white coating.─Putrid smell from the mouth in the
morning.

9. Throat.─

Sensation as if there were something
hard in the throat.─Deglutition hindered by a kind of nausea.─Noise
while swallowing.─Burning in the throat, with uneasiness, as from
internal heat.─Bitter mucus in the throat.

10. Appetite.─

Taste putrid or bitter, or slimy.─Bitter
taste, esp. in the morning.─Thirst for cold water, without fever.─Longing
for alcoholic drinks.─Thirst for water, or desire to drink, with
repugnance to all liquids.─Loathing of food─principally
milk, meat, broth, and tobacco.─Liking for vinegar.─Want
of appetite, and tongue loaded with a white or yellowish coating.─(In
the evening) immoderate appetite, with sensation of fulness and cramp-like pressure in the
abdomen, immediately after a meal.─Irritable and plaintive humour, after
a meal in the evening.

11. Stomach.─

Frequent eructations, esp. in the
morning, empty, bitter, putrid, as from rotten eggs.─Belches after
coughing.─Rising of a bitter mucus or of salt water.─Nausea,
with inclination to vomit, chiefly in the morning.─Nausea, and empty
vomiturition.─Retching even in the night, with pressure in the
precordial region.─Vomiting of coagulated blood, of a deep colour.─After
drinking (or eating), vomiting of what has been taken, often with a mixture of blood.─Pressure,
fulness, contraction, and cramp-like pain in the stomach and in the precordial region.─Shootings
in the pit of the stomach, with pressure extending to the back, and tightness of the chest.

12. Abdomen.─

Shootings in the region of the
spleen, with difficulty of breathing.─Pressure in the hepatic region.─Abdomen
hard and swollen, with pain of incisive excoriation in the sides, chiefly in the morning,
mitigated by the emission of wind.─Pain in the umbilical region when
moving.─Shocks across the abdomen.─Pain, as of
contusion, in the sides.─Flatulence, having the smell of rotten eggs.─Cutting,
colicky pains in the abdomen.─Colic with strangury.─Tympanites.

13. Stool and Anus.─

Constipation, with
ineffectual attempt to go to stool.─Stools in the form of pap, of an
acid odour.─Flatus, smelling like rotten eggs.─Diarrha,
with tenesmus.─Frequent, scanty, small, mucous stools.─Involuntary
stools, chiefly during the night; thin, brown, or white.─Stools of
undigested matter.─Purulent, bloody stools.─Hæmorrhoids.─Pressure
in the rectum.─Tenesmus.─Thread-worms.

14. Urinary Organs.─

Tenesmus.─Spasmodic
retention of urine, with pressure in the bladder.─Ineffectual attempts
to make water.─Involuntary emission of urine, at night in bed, and in
the day, when running.─Frequent micturition of pale urine.─Urine
of a brownish red, with sediment, of a brick colour.─Emission of blood.

15. Male Sexual Organs.─

Bluish red swelling of
the penis and of the scrotum.─Inflammatory swelling of the testes (in
consequence of contusion).─Purple-red swelling of the penis and
testicles, after mechanical injuries.─Hydrocele.─Painful
swelling of the spermatic cord, with shooting in the testes, extending to the abdomen.─Sexual
desire increased, with erections, pollutions, and seminal emission on the slightest amorous
excitement.─Impotence from excess or abuse.

16. Female Sexual Organs.─

Discharge of blood from
the uterus, between the periods, with nausea.─Excoriation and ulceration
of the breasts.─Soreness of the parts after a severe labour.─Violent
after-pains.─Erysipelatous inflammation of the mammæ and nipples.─Violent
stitches in middle of l. breast.─Vomiting of pregnancy.─Threatened
abortion from fall, &c.─Feeling as if ftus were lying crosswise.─Tumour
of breast.

17. Respiratory Organs.─

Dry, short cough,
produced by a titillation in the larynx.─Cough at night during sleep.─Paroxysm
of cough, preceded by tears, and cough with children after having wept and sobbed from
caprice and waywardness.─Whooping-cough; child cries before the cough
comes on; and after.─Cough with bloodshot eyes, or nose-bleed.─Even
yawning provokes a cough.─Cough with expectoration of blood; the blood
is clear, frothy, mixed with coagulated masses and mucus.─Even without
cough there is expectoration of black, coagulated blood after every corporeal effort.─Inability
to eject the mucus; what the cough detaches is therefore swallowed.─On
coughing, shooting pains in the head, or a bruise-like pain in the chest.─Breath
fetid; short, and panting.─Excessive difficulty of breathing.─Cough
worse in the evening till midnight, from motion, in the warm room, and after drinking.

18. Chest.─

Respiration short, panting, difficult,
and anxious.─Rattling in the chest.─Oppression of
the chest and difficulty of breathing.─Respiration frequently slow and
deep.─Shootings in the chest and sides, with difficulty of respiration,
aggravated by coughing, but breathing deeply, and by movement; better from external
pressure.─Pain, as of a bruise and of compression in the chest.─Burning
or rawness in the chest.─Sensation of soreness of the ribs.─Stitches
in the chest (l.), aggravated from a dry cough, with oppression of breathing; < from motion, > from
external pressure.

19. Heart.─

Beating, and palpitation of the heart.─Pain
from liver up through l. chest and down l. arm, veins of hands swollen, purplish; sudden
pain as if heart squeezed or had got a shock (angina pectoris).─Heart
strained; irritable; stitches in; from l. to r.─Painful pricking in the
heart, with fainting fits.

20. Neck and Back.─

Weakness of the muscles of the
neck; the head falls backwards.─Painful swelling of the glands of the
neck.─Pains, as from a bruise, and of dislocation in the back, in the
chest, and the loins.─Tingling in the back.─Great
soreness of the back.─Dragging-down pain and sense of weight in loins.

22. Upper Limbs.─

Pain, as if from fatigue, and
crawlings in the arms and in the hands.─Pain, as of dislocation, in the
joints of the arms and hands.─Tingling, in the arms.─Sensation
of soreness of the arms.─Sensation as if the joints of the arms and
wrists were sprained.─Darting in the arm.─Veins in
the hands swollen, with full and strong pulse.─Want of strength in the
hands on grasping anything.─Cramps in the fingers.

23. Lower Limbs.─

Pains, as from fatigue or from
dislocation, or acute drawing in the different parts of the lower limbs.─Painful
paralytic weakness in the joints, chiefly of the hip and knee.─Want of
strength in the knee, with failing of the joint when walking.─Tension in
the knee, as from contraction of the tendons.─Pale swelling in the knee.─Sensation
of soreness in the legs.─Inflammatory erysipelatous swelling of the feet
with pain, and aggravation of the pain by movement.─Hot, painful, hard,
and shining swelling of the great toes.─Tingling in the legs and feet.

24. Generalities.─

Tearing, drawing in outer
parts.─Pricking, from without, inward.─Pressing in
inner parts.─Tingling in outer parts.─Acute drawing,
crawling, pricking, or paralytic pains, and sensation as from a bruise in the limbs and the
joints, as well as in the injured parts.─Pain, as if sprained in outer
parts, and in the joints.─Pains, as of dislocation.─Rheumatic
and arthritic pains.─Restlessness in the diseased parts, which causes
them to be constantly in motion.─Aggravation of pains in the evening and
at night, as well as from movement, and even from noise.─Unsettled
pains, which pass rapidly from one joint to the other.─Soreness of the
whole body, with tingling.─Stiffness of the limbs after exertion.─Muscular
jerking.─Stiffness and weariness of all the limbs.─Sensation
of agitation and trembling in the body, as if all the vessels were throbbing.─Extreme
sensibility of the whole body, chiefly of the joints and of the skin.─Over-sensitiveness
of the whole body.─Bleeding of internal and external parts (vomiting of
blood).─Ebullition of the blood, and congestion in the head, with heat
and burning in the upper parts of the body; and cold, or coolness, in the lower parts.─Fainting
fits, with loss of consciousness, in consequence of mechanical injuries.─Convulsions,
traumatic trismus and tetanus.─General prostration of strength.─Paralytic
state (on the l. side) in consequence of apoplexy.─Dropsy of inner
parts.

25. Skin.─

Hot, hard, and shining swelling of the
parts affected.─Stings of insects; snake-bites.─Red,
bluish, and yellowish spots, as if from contutions.─Black and blue spots
on the body.─Yellow-green spots, caused either by a bruise or by
disease.─Bed sores; blue mortification.─Miliary
eruption.─Petechiæ.─Many small boils, or
blood-boils; one after another, extremely sore.

26. Sleep.─

Great drowsiness during the day,
without being able to sleep.─Inclination to sleep, early in the evening.─Comatose
drowsiness with delirium.─Wakens at night with a hot head, and is afraid
to sleep for fear of its recurrence.─Anxious dreams about animals.─Sleep
not refreshing and full of anxious and terrible dreams, and waking with starts and frights.─Dreams
of death, of mutilated bodies, of unbraiding, of indecision.─During
sleep, groans, talking, snoring, involuntary stools and urine.─Giddiness
on waking.

27. Fever.─

Pulse very variable, mostly hard, full
and quick.─Chilliness, internally, with external heat.─Great
chilliness, with heat and redness of one cheek.─Chilliness of the side
on which he lies.─Head alone, or face alone, hot, rest of body cool.─Shivering,
principally in the evening, and sometimes with a sensation as if one were sprinkled with
cold water.─Heat in the evening or at night, with shivering on raising
the bed-clothes, even slightly, and frequently with a pain in the back and in the limbs.─Dry
heat over the whole body, or only in the face and on the back.─Fever,
with much thirst, even before the shiverings.─Before the fever, dragging
sensation in all the bones.─Intermittent fever; chill in the morning or
forenoon drawing pains in the bones before the fever; changes his position continually
breath and perspiration offensive.─During the apyrexia, pain in the
stomach, want of appetite and loathing of animal food.─Perspiration
smelling sour or offensive─sometimes cold.─Typhus,
putrid breath and stool.─Nocturnal acid sweat.